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Topic: I am Jeffron (Read 9178 times)

The Ezrites have discovered our activity in the Drain. The situation there is compromised. Mortals of human and fey blood walk freely there. We have left, and myself, Leena, Del, and Thalia, now hide. We ran into two red-cloaked maguses.. we drove them off. Thalia went in pursuit, but found no evidence of their passing.

The Grey Robed Man is none other than Kriegvogel. I will hunt him down.

I met with many of the Brood's members, over the past few days. Faucon seems... strange. I cannot place it. I spoke with Thalia in the forests for a few hours, she asked a boon of me. She told me to tell Annika, "His name is Nor'Tiraj Val'Taerion". I will do this.

Leena seems impatient for the fabled belt. I will continue my search for it, however.

I have again met Du Bourg. We spoke at length, and we discussed his theory and my own. We elaborated that we can in fact help one another. He spoke of a man, who was sent to the Zarcroft Asylum. He had his personality and memories replaced, and Du Bourg brought his life back. This is truly fascinating, in theory and practical application. In return, I allowed Du Bourg to view the Ronan Experiment.

[Jeffron wakes up... in the Ecaterine Husk. He stands, as the Callers begin killing the cultists. They don't seem to notice him, and he walks down the hill. Eventually, he finds his way to an abandoned inn. He enters, and finds there, a woman, named Tarinyar. At some point, before he carved her up with his razor sharp knife but after he carved words into his arm to calm his hand, he found the Book... the Journal]

I... I don't know how this happened. From what I've read, this has happened before. I have lost myself, yet again, from what I see. I... apparently, I'm Jeffron. I'm an undead creature. I know many of my kind, and I've been conducting... an "Experiment". I think I will continue.. because the goal appeals to me. Apparently I am to meet one "Jusuf Hakiam", to learn about brains. Another thing I didn't do before forgetting, was capture "Bernard Du Bourg". Based on the drawings, he's a man in a suit, with a black cloak, and walks with a cane. I am fortunate indeed, that I supplied myself with sketches of all of the people I've encountered.

[Jeffron sits atop Mt. Baratak, the frozen air not touching his dead bones]

There are things in this world, that I will never understand. I will never understand how warmblooded, feeble mortals, with their waving swords, can keep their minds so easily in check. I will not unerstand, why I need to right. Why I need to constantly need to worry. I am an immortal being, with power flowing through me. And yet...

Enough musings in prose.

I have read through these books, these dossiers and accounts. I recognize the hand as my own, but the words written there are alien to me, as the depths of the mortal mind. I feel the splinter, that the author spoke about.. I feel it digging, yet I cannot be sure why it is myself. I know that I sought this fate.. through means less wholesome. I know that I have been a multitude of personas. Eawin, Virgil, Jeffron.. all the same, yet unknown of each other until now. I feel this.. driving need to -know- these primordial prototypes. This craving, this desire, this LUST for it... it is maddening.

Blood stains a great deal of the entry... the writing is sketchy, and erratic.

He did it to me.. I.. no.. this isn't right. I can't... see anymore. Wait. Nevermind.

There is blood everywhere.. and I am having trouble remembering why. He... the man. Jus... The name is slipping.... I swore.. never again.. I always FAIL. I can't.. hold on to anything anymore. After he...

Gore drips onto the next few words... as Jeffron tentatively raised his claw to touch the hole bored into his skull; he twitches, and settles back down, sitting on the operating bench of Doctor Jusuf Hakiam, watching the doctor bleed and moan as he writes.

The words written before this, they are in my hand... but it is as if an imposter has learned my letters, and imitates me... the way he thought, the way he.. everything. It's all wrong.

I.. am Je-.. JE! JE! JE!

Raging at his own futile attempts to write his own name, Jeffron, the Damned Recorder, scratches the words out over and over... the entry is unsigned.

The prior entry... looking back, is an atrocity to the keeping of clean, concise records.

Reviewing what the imposter wrote, I had apparently planned to meet the Doctor. (I still have trouble remembering... names... they are somehow, how can I explain it... cut.) In any case... what I intended to learn from him, resulted in disaster. I can only hazily remember a few red-stained memories of staggering through his operating room.. after stabbing him repeatedly. He put the hole in my skull. I can't remember... what the reasoning was behind this. There was a corpse on the ground, with the skull opened. The brain inside was dry. Dry! I left... in that murky red haze. It was much later until I was completely in control again.

I met a strange woman in the sewers... a white skinned, white haired mortal, who spoke a strange lilting tongue. She wore purple and green. Her name is Bai Shan. Since I had forgotten the appearance of my face, I had her draw it.

A rough, average drawing, only modestly accurate as to the subject matter it is depicting.

Later, as I tried to dig through my mind for memories... I met a strange white dressed man. He never named himself, but called himself "of the Eighth Circle", which I can only assume means some assinine definition of magical power. In any case... he offered me a book of stunning potential; the Tome of Mysteries. The only payment he asked, was knowledge on the Shadow Fey. I needed to use the Orb in my bags, along with my entire collection of rarities, but I managed to satisfy him. The books boon is... It will require extensive research, is all I'm prepared to say now.

-The Re

The word stops there... Jeffron still fails to remember his full name.. to write and speak it, is beyond him.

It is time to move on. New avenues must be pursued. My past is now paramount. [Jeffron writes, as he watches a skeleton he had animated tear through other lesser undead] The failures and losses I have suffered are all direct results of the Experiment. The past, everything... I will recover it. I will have it. Or this Splinter will drive deep enough to render me insane. It's all... twisted. Some memories seem to be altered... things seem wrong. Thus, the Experiment is ended. The Subjects are free.

And now, on the horizon, for now and ever, my history awaits.

-Jef fron The Re cor der. [the signature is split up.. as he had to recall each syllable individually]

I have a new goal... something to divert me from this Splinter, as futile as that is. I realize, as all intelligent corpses like myself must, that I will be forced to pursue the Splinter's Easing, no matter how hard I try to avoid it. It will burn, dig, damn, until my destruction.

But, back to the matter at hand. I am done my Experimentation on Saoire... but I am not done with her, yet.

I doubt I will ever be done.

-The ReCorder

[His signature, while inconsistant in hand, is smoother than before.. he is becoming more comfortable with his old moniker, no doubt]

It's the clarity that I've noticed. I can see... dripping, I can sense the pressure of the humidity, the smells of sewage, its rank, fetid stench magnified like under a glass. What's strange is, the smell, while vile, doesn't bother me. It's as if I've been blessed. I can hear the rats ruminate, fester and breed. I can see their eyes light up with panic as I near them. I can sense every change in their little faces, before I decide whether or not to wither them up, like everything else. I can see their terror, their confusion... Even more obvious, the face of a human. For all of the faces of the mortals I've hurt, maimed, or slain, I saw every facet of their horror, the miasma of emotion as my blade, spell, or otherwise descended upon them. When I... I

[Jeffron pauses, concentrating, trying desperately to recall what it is he has done]

Took the spike from my skull, the one that was driven deep by the Cursed Doktor, I looked at him, through the mad, raging crimson of my gaze. I remember, (I think) how his eyes lit up, with a mixture of fascination... fascination and a strange emotion; He was not like the others, because of this. That other, alien emotion to one so close to his doom, was delight. I saw it, like the fine trails of mixed paint, just before the ingrediants finally mix properly. I saw it laced there. So as I drove the spike into his eyes, I knew that there is more out there to notate, to experience. Emotions, easy to read with this... clarity. I am curious. Perhaps, I shall actively pursue the study of mortal minds, specifically, the minds of those that know who I was... who can ease this damned burning. It is a nagging thing, this little jagged Splinter. I can hardly focus anymore. I must hunt... hunt my past, like the wolf hunts his mark. I will chase it, yes, chase.

[Jeffron clucks his slug-like black tongue, looking down at the elf-corpse before him]

In my thoughts, I've come to realize a key element. In order to come into contact with the ones mentioned to know me, I will undoubtedly need a mortal... a pawn, if you will. So, I have begun the search; while this does little to ease the agony, it gives me a sense of purpose... and somewhat alleviates the restlessness. I noticed a mortal, in my sewer domain. I brought him to a secluded room, interviewed him. He was unsuitable. I gave him the choice between death, and pain. He chose the former, and was rewarded in kind.

I... have found her. Yes... the chase is so similar to with Saoire. She has friends... but they will fade, just like the others. She is controlled by her cowardice... this is something I will rectify.

[Jeffron sketches Olivia Greycastle with eerie memory... every detail, every speck of dirt on her face as she screamed, when he left her.]

Olivia. Olivia is her name. She recognized my title, the Recorder. Yes. [Jeffron is obviously very excited by these recent developments... the path has been set, the Splinter is eased] She heard my name from a man named Gert. I will find him, and interrogate him. I will chase them, starting from now, back to... Eawin. Eawin, that elf from those by-gone days.

Whenever I think about who I might have been... I get terrible pain in my head. It's as if my brain is twisting and turning.. like it refuses to accept what I'm trying to imagine. I don't understand this, but it must be Jusuf's fault, because he did so much damage.

[Jeffron pauses, and continues on his rhetoric]

I sent out the Lights, to find what was going on. When he found Olivia, that idiot friend of her had gotten help. There was a witch-type, who had a flaming sword. He claimed to be in league with Strahd, and he threatened me on those grounds. I informed him, that I was aware of Strahd and his devices... and he flippantly said he was too. In any case...

[Jeffron stares across the small fire pit in the Drain.. straight, deep into Sera Patton]

I have met someone who will do favours for money. This is indeed a good development. Her name is Sera Patton. She wears red and white. She told me, that one is seeking to... protect my newest interest. I think I shall enter into his life, and perhaps try to manipulate him in my favour. Ciaran is his name. Perhaps he was the one who came rushing back as I met Olivia..?

Fed on one "Jessica". Thought about the encounter with the man with the flaming sword. He may or may not be a risk, dependant on if he truly serves Strahd. I remember Ann [Jeffron can not finish the name..] Ann... A female vampire. She mentioned him, Strahd, as a sort of ally to our old Family. Perhaps I can speak with her. More information later.

Jeffron sits, nervous, in the Laboratory where he was the cause of so much agony. He looks around. He sees a pregnant little drop of humid water gather on the edge of a steaming machine in the depths of the fishing station. He observes it with a lucid clarity, that few can dream of. He watches it curiously, as it grows, wobbles, and falls... so far to the ground. He watches its descent, as it passes by a window...

"Window?" He asks confusedly.

He has walked to the upper level, and he did not notice. He fails to notice his own movement through space. He wrapped in his own mind. Cataconic, he drifts. In this lucid stasis, he floats through the building, observing tiny minutiae slide by. So focused on so little, for those blessed moments, he isn't even aware of the soul-burning pain of his compulsion.. his drive. He awoke, so enraged, to find his book not in his hands. He panicked. He feared. He couldn't even speak, couldn't form the syllables, his tongue protested. The rage, the strange unfairness.

He looks out the window, over across the lake. He watches, with such precision, a fisherman reels in a catch, the pulley dragging the net from the water dripping, filled with fish. He watches in his tunnel vision, the panicking, trapped eyes of the things, flopping, between the ropes.

He thinks: "They are so trapped.. so trapped by things they are only dimly aware of. It's like me. Like me, they are entangled in events they don't understand. There is one difference. One difference between me and a trapped animal, yes... I will be free, and I -will- know. I will."

Jeffron turns from the window, and eyes with a dispassionate curiousity, his own shaking hands. Dimly, he is aware, that the book will save him his anxiety. Will alleviate the terror, the impending darkness. It's not quite the darkness he is so horrified of... but the moment, that he knows he has felt an innumerable amount of times before now. Those lasting twilight moments, when he has time to appreciate his minds every facet slowly fading into darkness. Those endless instants, as he can appreciate the shadows as they fall on his mind, like the Mists themselves.

[Jeffron walks calmly from the Drain's exit, a great deal poorer, but unscathed]

Had a strange, disconcerting, and advantageous encounter.

I was in the resting quarters of the under-world, and I approached the door guard behind the tents. We spoke, he seemed suspicious of me. After introducing myself, he told me the Bosses wanted to see me. I knew that I had gone too far to go back at this point, so I entered. We spoke. Alex has made another, if ineffective move to corner me. He entered into the drain with a group of mortals, and apparently squeezed the bosses into agreeing to dispatch me for them. The more vocal boss, Knives, wasn't pleased by their attitude. In fact, he will help me out. I offered him fifteen thousand coins, for my protection, and he accepted. Now, he wants me to capture Alex, and notify him. With my old associate's help, this shouldn't prove incredibly difficult.

Jeffron stands stands before the Drain Bosses. He looks them over with a speculative eye. He tries desperately, not to look at the Watcher.

"He stares at me. I don't like it. What does he see? What is it that I am missing?"

He looks behind him a moment, as Knives debriefs him, after a glance at the gaudy jewels on the long table in front of him. He looks long and hard at the rusted iron door. He considers his meeting. His meeting with Alexander.

He remembers looking down at him, as he forced him to swear the oath. The oath that would with luck protect him from any action.

"Perhaps I should have made a ritual out of it... make it truly binding."

He remembers, clearly, the smirk on Alexander's face, even in the face of the one he hunted, at Jeffron the Recorder's feet. Jeffron the Damned thinks about this, a slight touch of concern tinging his wandering thoughts. He glances down at his book, then remembers he is supposed to be listening to Knives.

Knives said, "He's a bigger idjut than I thought 'ee wos. Blar!"

Jeffron, confused, thinks back. He can remember now, himself recounting what had happened in the little cell with the thread-bare cot. Why did he not notice speaking? Why did he not notice anything happening?

"Am I caught in the past? Am I frozen in time?" Jeffron frowns, and recalls the story actively, in his murky mind's eye.

Alexander awoke in confusion, from a breathless, cold sleep. He woke, wondering why he awoke from his lake-side nap, in a cell.

"I should wager that Alexander did not even realize who he stood before, for the first few moments.." Jeffron sighs, looking back at the Bosses, and seeing that he is done, he leaves the lair of the run-off of society, to continue his wandering chase of his past.